Omoiizuru koromohakanashi waremohitomo mishiniwaarazu tadoraruruyoni

English Translation

What I remember—
those days, this robe, both fleeting;
neither you nor I
remain as once we were seen,
in a world we grope our way through

Meaning

The days I remember, and this robe, are alike fleeting. Neither you nor I are what we were, in a world through which we grope our way.

Commentary

Book Three: Fujigoromo

At that time there lived an old prince whom no one counted. He was Prince Moriada, third son of Takakura and elder brother of the cloistered sovereign at Oki. Long before, when Go-Shirakawa was choosing among his grandsons, this prince had wept, and so had never come to the throne; he lived resentful of the world, and his residence had grown deep in grass and choked with vines. In the Kempo years a woman of his household dreamed that many men in court caps came and said the regalia were to be brought in and that all should make ready, but the prince thought nothing of it and at last took the tonsure. Then came the rising, and all the family of the senior retired emperor were scattered; since no suitable sovereign remained, by the decision of the east the son of this cloistered prince, then ten years old, was suddenly set on the throne on the ninth day of the seventh month of Joukyu 3. The father was given the title of retired sovereign and called cloistered emperor. That a grandson of an emperor should come to the throne had not happened since Konin, and it was thought remarkable. He came of age in the first month of Joo 1; his personal name was Yutahito, and his mother was Kitashirakawain, daughter of the Middle Counselor Motoie. Lord Iezane returned to the regency. In the fifth month of the next year the cloistered emperor died and the whole realm went into mourning. The former emperor had been deposed at four and was not even granted a title; his mother, Higashi Ichijoin, lived in a mountain village and grieved in loneliness. She was the daughter of the late regent Go-Kyogoku Yoshitsune and skilled in the way of poetry, but her nature was reserved, quiet and grave, and even Juntoku, who loved her without limit, had found her too much so. After their far parting she lay sunk in grief, and answered with a poem when a woman who had long served her sent robes for the seasonal change; she wrote another while practising her hand. In the Kanki years Michiie again became regent, his daughter entered the palace as consort, and the world was brilliant. Consorts succeeded one another rapidly, and titles were later given as Akimon'in and Takatsukasain. In Kanki 3 Michiie passed the regency to his son Norizane and became senior lord; his sons held the shogunate in the east, the Tendai abbacy, the Miidera and Yamashina offices and the Ninnaji cloister, a flourishing without precedent. In the eleventh month of that year the retired emperor of Awa died at thirty-seven. Shomeimon'in's grief was without limit, and she wept over the utensils he had used there and the letters from Oki that had been gathered together. Kozaisho, daughter of Ietaka of the second rank, sank deeper than anyone and dyed her mourning robes black, and composed a poem. In Joei 1 the Middle Counselor Teika was charged with a collection and presented it within the year; it is called the Shinchokusen. In the same month Go-Horikawa, gravely ill, abdicated, and his two-year-old son came to the throne. The empress was tormented by spirits and died on the eighteenth day of the ninth month of Tempuku 1 at twenty-five; she is called Sohekimon'in. The Mibu no Kyo no Naishi no Suke, daughter of the Middle Counselor Teika, sank into grief past bearing, took the tonsure, and answered an enquiry with a poem. In the fifth month of Bunryaku 1 the deposed emperor of Joukyu died at seventeen, and on the sixth day of the eighth month Go-Horikawa died at about twenty-three. From the end of the third month of Katei 1 the regent Norizane fell gravely ill and died at twenty-six, so Michiie returned to the regency and governed for a third time; the purification and thanksgiving were held that winter. At Oki the retired emperor heard faintly of such things in the capital, and as his years increased and his sorrows only thickened, he found his one solace in the way of poetry. He sent topics to the capital by whatever means offered and called for poems; Ietaka of the second rank gathered the poems of others as well and sent them, and Hideyoshi, who had taken the tonsure after the rising and called himself Nyogan, answered the summons too. The retired emperor judged the poems himself, and wrote poems of his own while practising his hand. He had lived on that shore some nineteen years when he died on the twenty-second day of the second month of En'o 1, at sixty. His wish to return once to the capital had been deep, but it came to nothing. Yoshimochi of the Northern Guard carried his ashes to the capital about his neck; they were placed in the Lotus Hall at Ohara, and by Shumeimon'in's arrangement the Minase villa was transferred to it. He was at first given the name Kentokuin, but about the Ninji years this was changed and he came to be called Go-Toba In.
Prince Moriada was the third son of Takakura and elder brother of Go-Toba; he later received the title of retired sovereign and was called cloistered emperor. His son was the reigning emperor Go-Horikawa, whose mother was Kitashirakawain, daughter of the Middle Counselor Motoie. Higashi Ichijoin, mother of the former emperor deposed after the Joukyu rising, was the daughter of the late regent Go-Kyogoku Yoshitsune and the consort of Juntoku, who had been moved to Sado. Shomeimon'in was the mother of the retired emperor of Awa, that is Tsuchimikado. Michiie of Komyobuji served as regent and chancellor; his wife was the daughter of Lord Kintsune, his son was the regent Norizane of Toin, and his daughter was the empress Sohekimon'in. Lord Iezane was the son of the Fugenji lord and alternated in the regency with Michiie. The daughter of the Chancellor Kimifusa of Sanjo was later called Akimon'in, and Iezane's daughter Takatsukasain. Kozaisho was the daughter of Ietaka of the second rank, and the Mibu no Kyo no Naishi no Suke the daughter of the Middle Counselor Teika. Hideyoshi took the tonsure after the rising and called himself Nyogan; Yoshimochi served in the Northern Guard, became a monk, and attended the retired emperor in exile.
After the rising, the former emperor was deposed at four and was not even granted a title. His mother, Higashi Ichijoin, lived in a mountain village and grieved without end. She was skilled in the way of poetry, but her nature was reserved, quiet and grave, and she would not lightly let even small things be known. Though she had mastered the koto past measure, she scarcely ever touched it, and even Juntoku, who loved her without limit, had found her too withdrawn.
After that far parting she lay sunk in grief, brooding on everything. A woman who had long served her, then living in retirement in the country, sent her a sorrowful letter along with robes for the change of season about the first of the tenth month, and this poem is her reply. Higashi Ichijoin was the daughter of the regent Go-Kyogoku Yoshitsune and the consort of Juntoku, who had been moved to Sado.
It is followed by "Kiekanuru inochizotsuraki onajiyoni arumotanomiwa kakenuchigirio", said to have escaped her only while she was practising her hand, and the narrator adds that one can hardly imagine what she must feel.

The first line is the act of calling back the past. In the second, the word for those days is also the word for a robe, so that the garment sent to her and the time she remembers are held in one sound, and the occasion of the reply becomes the language of the poem itself. The adjective means fleeting or not to be relied on, and can attach to both the remembered days and the robe. The third line sets herself and the other side by side, and the fourth says that neither remains as once seen. At the close, the verb means to grope or to lose one's way, with an auxiliary of spontaneity, and the poem breaks off, leaving the world it names hanging. The movement runs from a concrete garment to a season of time, then to the change in both people, and out at last into the age itself. She makes no direct complaint and sets down only the one word for having changed, and in that restraint the nature described as never lightly disclosed shows itself.

Author

Higashi Ichijoin

Source

Masukagami

Other